Czechoslovakia Actions Speak Louder

Talk about empty gestures. Along with representatives from 34 other countries, Czechoslovak Foreign Minister Jaromir Johanes arrived in Vienna last week to attend the final session of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. One main purpose of the meeting: to approve the most far-ranging document on human rights since the Helsinki accords in 1975. But Johanes' endorsement only underscored the hypocrisy of the Czech regime. That day, baton-wielding police used tear gas, water cannons and dogs against 4,000 ^ people who were about to begin a peaceful demonstration in Prague's Wenceslas Square. The rally was called to mark the 20th anniversary of the death of Jan Palach, a student who set fire to himself in protest against the 1968 Soviet- led invasion.

Two days later, U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz sharply criticized Czechoslovakia for violating the terms of the conference "but one hour after the adoption of the concluding document." Chastened Czech authorities then allowed 1,500 people to hold a peaceful demonstration while state video cameras surreptitiously photographed participants. The following day, however, police armed with truncheons brutally dispersed a crowd of 2,000 marchers. As ambulances raced around the square picking up bleeding and bruised protesters, other people were pushed into waiting vans and buses. At least 40 were arrested and dozens more injured in the melee. "It was terrible, terrible," said a witness. "I don't know what to tell my children about what is going on in their country."

By Friday, police had quelled the protests and banned a memorial planned for the weekend at Palach's birthplace, in a village about 20 miles north of Prague. Government officials assailed the rallies as antistate provocation aimed at capturing international attention. Said the Communist Party daily Rude pravo: "The instigators of these actions are intent on destabilizing our society, on pressuring the socialist state." Instigators such as Mikhail Gorbachev, perhaps? Ironically, many of the demonstrators had been chanting "Gorbachev, Gorbachev" and "Gorbachev is watching you," invoking the Soviet leader whose political reforms the Czech leadership claims to support but has so far failed to emulate.